Marcus Gray (right) at an event with legendary journalist Wolf Blitzer. When Marcus J. Gray, Sr. was elected to public office in 1964, America was a very different country. The Civil Rights Act had only just become law. Opportunities for Black Americans in elected government remained scarce. Yet in Calhoun County, Michigan, voters elected Gray as County Clerk/Register of Deeds, and he became recognized as the first Black American in the nation elected to serve as a county cle